Founded on February 24, 1843, Bossier Parish is bordered to the north by the state of Arkansas and its western boundary is drawn by the Red River in northwest Louisiana. For just under two centuries, the Bossier Parish courthouse has served as the central depot for millions of historical records that tell the story of the parish.
Tasked as custodians to many of these irreplaceable records in parishes across the state of Louisiana are Clerks of Court.
“In my decades of public service, I have witnessed the evolution of records management practices go from paper to digital. Digitizing our files means our deputies spend less time chasing files and more time serving the folks that walk into our office. While we love visitors, remote public access to records reduces the frequency that people have to come to the courthouse. ”
— Jill Sessions, Clerk of Court Bossier Parish
Hitting the ground running
In 2016, Jill Sessions was elected to her first term as Clerk of Court in Bossier Parish. Right away she set her sights on protecting the documents in her care and making them accessible to the public.
Her first order of business was determining which records to scan. Like most government offices, the volume of paper-based records to be scanned in Bossier Parish massively outweighed the budget allotted to scan them. Mrs. Sessions had to make the best use of her budget by prioritizing the order in which her records would be digitized.
Mrs. Sessions worked with our team to map out a plan to digitally transform her office over the course of a few years.
Land Records are the first collection to go digital in Bossier Parish
Like many clerks of court in Louisiana, Bossier Parish elected to start by scanning mortgage and conveyance records. Our team scanned all land records back to the beginning of the parish’s collection.
After scanning, we indexed each instrument to allow easy search and retrieval. To make the documents accessible to the public, we worked with Bossier Parish’s software provider, Software & Services, to import the scanned images and index data.
Continuing the path to digital in other departments
After completing the land record collection, Mrs. Sessions shifted the parish’s focus to the other record collections in her office.
Civil record scanning, indexing, and redaction
In 2017, we began the process of scanning all civil records for the parish. One wrinkle for this project was redacting sensitive information like social security numbers. For redaction projects, our operators go through every digital image line by line to mask all necessary data.
We completed the project in early 2018. All civil records have now been scanned and indexed.
Criminal record scanning, indexing, and redaction
In the spring of 2019, we started the process of digitizing all criminal files for Bossier Parish. This collection was unique in that a large portion of the index data already existed in their case management system. For these records, we scanned the files and worked with Software & Services to link the scanned images to the index data.
In total, we scanned over half a million pages. As of March 2020, we completed the scanning of all criminal files and are nearing completion of the indexing and data import process.
The future is bright for Bossier Parish
“Working with Revolution Data Systems could not have been a better decision. They truly understand the inner-workings of a clerk’s office. Chris guided us every step of the way to make sure that we stayed within budget and that our records were scanned and indexed correctly.”
After a multi-year engagement, Mrs. Sessions and her office can see the light at the end of the tunnel. She is a few months away from completing a digital transformation for her parish.
This transformation saw nearly two centuries of historical records preserved for eternity. Deputies and researchers will soon have instant digital access to these records, creating streamlined and efficient processes for the parish.
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